Silziboulos or Dilziboulos, corresponding to the Sinjibu of Arab chroniclers and perhaps representing Sin-jabgu in old Turkish, the latter part being a title. He has been identified with Istämi. Justin sent as envoy to him in return a certain Zemark, who visited the khan at Ektel or Ektag (? Ak-dagh), and several subsequent embassies were exchanged. In 598 the khan Tardu wrote to the emperor Maurice, and in 620-28 the Turks assisted Heraclius in his campaigns against Persia. Meanwhile the Turks had themselves split into two divisions with separate princes. A tendency towards division, very natural in so loose and extended a community, had been visible for some time, and the rupture was precipitated in 582 by the jealousy of Ta-lo-pien or Dalobian, who was angry at not being chosen khan. For a century and a half or so we hear of two khanates: the northern Turks, living near Lake Baikal and the southern tributaries of the Yenisei, and the western[1] Turks, who appear to have had two headquarters, one near Urumchi and one near Aulieata, north of Tashkent. But their conquests, or at least their successful raids, extended very much farther to the west and south. In 630 the Chinese pilgrim Yüan Chwang (Hsüan Tsang) was well received by their khan, T'ung-she-ho, who exercised some kind of authority from Turfan to Merv. The Chinese followed a consistent policy of spreading dissension among these dangerous tribes and of supporting the factions which were weak or distant against those who were strong or near. Accordingly they were friendly to the western Turks until they had conquered the northern Turks. This western branch lasted until about 750 as a political name. From about 550 till 650 they were independent, and, as mentioned, allies of the east Roman Empire against the Persians. But about 650 the politics of the Nearer East were transformed by the conquests of the Arabs following on the preaching of Mahomet. After subduing Persia in 639 they spread to Transoxiana. At the same time dissension prevailed among the western Turks themselves: the five tribes called Nu-she-pi, who lived west of Issyk-kul, quarrelled with the five tribes called Tu-lu living to the east of it. The Chinese fomented the quarrel, and in 659 were able to declare that they annexed the whole territory of the western Turks, including at least Dzungaria, Tashkent, Ferghana, Bokhara, Khulm, Badakshan, Ghazni, Bamian, Udyana, Wakhan and Karateghin. But it would seem that neither the Turkish occupation nor the Chinese annexation of most of these countries was effective. From 650 to 750 the possession of them was disputed not only by the Turks and Chinese but by the Tibetans in the east and the Arabs in the west. In the west, the campaigns of Qotaiba b. Moslim or Kutaiba (705-14) completed the Mahommedan conquest of Transoxiana (see Caliphate, sect. B § 6). In the east the really effective power seems to have been exercised by a new Turkish tribe called Turgash, who had capitals at Tokmak and in Ili.
For the history of the northern Turks our only authorities are the Orkhon inscriptions and Chinese writers. The half-century following on the division was prosperous for the northern as well as for the western Turks, and they menaced China; but in 630 the Chinese conquered them. This is the Chinese servitude mentioned in the inscriptions. In 682 Kutluk (also called Elteres, which seems to be a title) re-established a Turkish state on the Orkhon. He was succeeded by his brother Kapagan (or Me-Chuo), who subdued the Turgäsh, or perhaps merely drove them southwards, early in the 8th century, and was succeeded by Bilgä Kagan of the inscriptions.
This northern khanate was destroyed by a coalition of the Karluk, Uighur and Basmal in 744. These peoples, like the Turgäsh, appear to have been Turkish; for though Turk was originally the name of the clan whose destinies in its northern and western branches have just been sketched, yet there is no objection to the usage by which it is extended to the descendants of similar clans with similar customs and as far as is known similar languages. A succession of these pressed forwards from the east. When first heard of, the Karluk inhabited the country on the Irtysh and the Urungu, and subsequently occupied Teles and Tokmak. The Uighurs belonged to the group of tribes known as Tölös or T'ie-le and established themselves at Balasaghun (also known by the forms Kara-Balghasun, Kara-Balgassun and Balagasun: see Karakorum). This brings us to the middle of the 8th century. For the next two hundred years the Turkish element in Central Asia, though it must have been numerous, does not cut any figure in history, which is filled with the chronicles of Arab and Persian dynasties (see Caliphate; Samanids), but in the 10th century we begin to hear of it again. Turkish adventurers founded the dynasty of Ghaznevids at Ghazni, and there was a Uighur kingdom in the east comprising Kashgar and Khotan. Boghra Khan, the ruler of this kingdom, was converted to Islam at the end of the 10th century, and it continued under various branches of Uighurs until 1120. An interesting memorial of this period is the book Kudatku Bilik (see below). More important politically is the rise of the Seljuks. They were the princely family of the Kabaks, who were a section of the group of tribes called Ghuzz (Oghuz, Οὔζοι), and are heard of in Transoxiana about 985. Their chieftains Toghrul and Chakir drove the Ghaznevids to India and established themselves as protectors of the Abbasid caliph, who formally ceded his temporal power to them. (For the history of the dynasty see Seljuks.) Alp Arslan, the son of Chakir, defeated the Byzantines at Manzikert (1071), and prepared the way for the Ottoman conquests. His son Malik Shah ruled over nearly all the modern Turkey in Asia, and as far as the frontiers of China. On his death in 1092 his empire broke up into several pieces. Konia became the capital of the sultanate of Asia Minor and various Seljuk dynasties established themselves in Kerman, Irak and Syria. A new Turkish power was founded by the khans of Khiva, who are known as the Khwarizm-shahs. They were originally vassals of the Seljuks, with the title of tasdar or ewer-bearer, but became independent and conquered Khorasan and Irak. They had, however, to contend with yet another new arrival from the east, the Kara-Kitais. These also were probably Turks, and were pushed westwards from China by the Kins. They conquered Kashgar, Khotan, Yarkand and later Transoxiana, pushing the Ghuzz tribes before them into Persia and Afghanistan. Their prince bore the title of gur-khan, and the Khwarizm shahs did homage to him till 1208, when they unsuccessfully revolted. But all these squabbling principalities were swept away in 1219 by the extraordinary wave of invasion which surged across Asia to Europe under Jenghiz Khan (q.v.). After the death of Jenghiz his conquests were divided, and Transoxiana, Kashgar, Badakshan, Balkh and Ghazni were given to his second son Chagatai or Jagatai. Jenghiz and his family must have been Mongols, but the name Jagatai passed to the population and language of the countries about the Oxus. It does not appear that they ever ceased to be Turkish in speech and customs. The hordes of Jenghiz must have comprised a considerable Turkish element; the Mongols had no inclination to settle in cities, and Jagatai himself lived near Kulja in the extreme east of his dominions. Though the cities in western Central Asia suffered severely the people were not Mongolized, and Mahommedan learning even flourished. But otherwise the whole history of the Jagatai khanate, which lasted from 1234 to 1370, is a confused record of dissensions with frequent intervals of anarchy. In 1321 it split into two khanates, Transoxiana and Dzungaria, and in 1370 collapsed before Timur. This great conqueror (1333-1404), who like Jenghiz had an extraordinary power of collecting and leading the hordes of Central Asia, was a native of the district of Samarkand and a Turk by descent. He conquered successively Dzungaria (1370), Persia and the Caucasus (1390), the Kipchaks on the Volga (1395), and Northern India (1398). He then invaded Syria and Asia Minor, where he defeated but did not annihilate the Osmanlis. The house of Timur did not retain his more distant conquests, but they ruled at
- ↑ No better name seems forthcoming, but western Turks is a most inconvenient designation because it is also used (and equally correctly) to signify the Osmanlis and Seljuks as opposed to the Turks of Transoxiana and Kashgar.
